


Hurting for a Smile

by glorious_spoon



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst and Porn, Dubious Consent, F/F, Semi-Public Sex, Vampire Isabelle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-15
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-09-01 13:44:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20259046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: After Isabelle is turned into a vampire and goes rogue, Clary helps Raphael track her down.It doesn't exactly go according to plan.





	Hurting for a Smile

**Author's Note:**

> This fic contains a dubiously consensual sexual encounter. While both Clary and Izzy are into it, Izzy is not in her right mind and nothing is really negotiated beforehand, so read (or don't!) with that in mind.
> 
> Also, in general, porn logic applies here.
> 
> Title is from Dark Side by Bishop Briggs, as is the inspiration for this fic.

“Here,” Raphael says, placing something in her hand. Clary takes it automatically before registering what it is, and when she does she nearly drops it. Her heart stutters sharply. Raphael’s expression doesn’t flicker, though he must hear it.

It’s a stake.

“What—” she takes a slow breath, stares at his impassive face. “What the hell is this for?”

“We’re hunting a rogue vampire,” Raphael says. “What do you think it’s for?”

Something sharp and awful passes through her, half-fury and half-heartbreak. “It’s _Izzy._”

A muscle in Raphael’s jaw twitches briefly. He tilts his head toward the dark sky, the street lamp overhead bathing his incongruously youthful face in a pale eerie glow. Finally, he says, “Do you know why I came to you instead of going directly to the Institute?”

“Uh, because Alec would have murdered you on sight?”

He inclines his head in acknowledgement. “Possibly. But that wasn’t the only reason. The Lightwoods are… not known for acting rationally when the lives of the people they love are on the line.”

“And you think I _am?_” Clary asks.

“I think you’re someone who’s willing to do what needs to be done. Whatever the cost.” Raphael gives her an assessing kind of look. “If I’m wrong, you can run along back to the Institute and I’ll handle this alone.”

“You mean kill her.”

“Isabelle was a friend,” Raphael says, and something flickers in his eyes. It’s the most human expression she’s ever seen him wear, and it makes Clary pause, fury draining away to be replaced by a cold, hollow ache. _Was._ “What happened to her is not her fault. But she would never forgive me if I allowed her to continue on like this, and it’s only a matter of time before the Institute catches up to her. When they do, they won’t treat her as gently as I will. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Isabelle Lightwood has been missing for a week. In that time, three mundanes have turned up dead, messily bitten and drained of blood. It’s clearly the work of a fledgeling vampire, and one that’s unusually good at avoiding detection even deep in the grip of blood hunger.

Shadowhunter training holds true, apparently, even after everything. She wonders if Alec and Jace might have made the connection on their own already. If they’re just trying as hard as they possibly can not to. Because it’s Izzy, it’s _Izzy_, their beloved sister, Izzy with her brilliant mind and her laughing dark eyes, the first, best friend that Clary ever had in this nightmarish funhouse world she’s found herself in.

Her fingers curl around the stake. She knows what the Clave does to rogue vampires. She’s not as innocent as she was when she first walked into this world.

“I understand,” she hears herself say. It comes out surprisingly steady. Steadier than she feels, anyway. “What’s the plan?”

*

They split up at the shipyard where the last of the bodies--a night watchman--was found just three hours ago. The scene has already been cleared, and Clary suspects Raphael’s involvement in that, especially since nobody from the Institute has shown up either.

She doesn’t ask. Raphael nods toward the warehouses on one side and says, “You go that way. We’ll meet by the dry dock if neither of us finds her.”

“Okay,” Clary says shortly, reaching for her stele.

Raphael gives her a long look, then shakes his head and sighs. She doesn’t know why, but when he speaks he sounds resigned. “Don’t let her kill you. She doesn’t deserve that.”

Before Clary can think of a way to respond to that, he’s slipping away into the darkness with that flickering, unnatural vampiric speed that she doesn’t think she’ll ever get used to. Clary takes a deep breath, activates her strength and speed runes, and starts off in the opposite direction.

She’s been walking for almost ten minutes before she becomes aware that someone is shadowing her. It’s nothing she can put her finger on at first. A flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye, a soft scrape of sound just at the edge of her hearing. A shadow moving in the wrong direction on the wall. It makes an atavistic, visceral kind of fear tangle in the pit of her stomach, the fear of an animal that knows it’s being hunted. Because that’s what it is. She’s not being followed. She’s being hunted.

Her heart is beating faster, which is_ not great _considering that she’s tracking a feral vampire, but it’s not like there’s anything she can do about it. She comes to a stop in the shadows between two warehouses, a pool of darkness beyond the pale glow of the street lamps.

“Izzy?” she says out loud. It sounds incredibly loud, echoing slightly off the corrugated sheet metal and hard concrete. “It’s me. It’s Clary.”

A shadow flickers to her left, then vanishes before she can look straight at it. She lifts her hands, and only then remembers that she’s still holding the stake. The polished wood is slick beneath her fingers.

She stares at it for a moment, then lets it drop.

The clatter echoes through the narrow space, and an instant later a dark shape darts out of the shadows to slam her up against the nearest wall. Her head cracks hard against the metal and she shakes it, blinking bright spots from her vision, and shoves back instinctively. A snarl, and the hands pinning her shoulders squeeze tighter, grinding her joints together painfully.

Izzy has always been stronger than she looks, all battle-hardened muscle under her soft curves and sleek hair and perfect makeup. Clary has sparred with her enough times to know that. To know the feeling of Izzy pinning her, fierce and breathless and laughing. She remembers the exhilaration of it, how they always seemed to be on the verge of some ledge that neither of them could bring themselves to tip over.

This is nothing like that. There’s nothing soft or laughing about Izzy now. Her hair is disheveled, her skin icy pale. The bright slash of red on her mouth isn’t lipstick. She’s still wearing the tight red dress she had on when she left the Institute a week ago, but her feet are bare and her skin is smeared with mud.

Her hands are cold, strong as iron, and Clary can still smell the ghost of her perfume over the stink of grave-dirt and old blood. She swallows hard, tears pricking at the corners of her eyes, and whispers, “Izzy.”

Dark eyes flick up to her face, pupils so dilated that they seem like black pits. For an instant, she allows herself to hope that she sees a flicker of sense in them, and then Izzy ducks her head, presses her lips to Clary’s throat, and murmurs, “You smell so good.”

Clary sucks a breath between her teeth. Her heart is running rabbit-quick. Her voice, when she speaks, comes out choked. “Izzy, do you know who I am?”

“Clary,” Izzy breathes. It’s low and rough in a way that does nothing at all to still Clary’s racing heart, and then Izzy’s lips part over her pulse point. Her mouth is cool, and Clary can feel the sharp edges of her teeth. “I know you.”

“You don’t want to hurt me.”

“No,” Izzy agrees absently. Her tongue licks out, a quick flicker like she’s tasting the fear-sweat on Clary’s skin and she makes a soft noise in the back of her throat, presses closer. Her teeth scrape, a bright sting. “I don’t.”

“So don’t,” Clary says. She reaches out, but doesn’t try to shove Izzy away. She already knows that it’ll do as much good as trying to push over a brick wall with her bare hands. Somehow her hand finds its way up into Izzy’s hair, soft and silky even now. She pushes it out of Izzy’s face with shaking fingers, touches her cheek. Understands, suddenly, what Raphael meant. How much crueler this is. Too late now. “Izzy, please—”

“I’m sorry,” Izzy says, very gently. It sounds almost lucid, and for a moment hope flares in Clary’s chest. Izzy shifts, lifts her head briefly. The light from the street lamp to their left reflects in her eyes, and her canines press into her lower lip, unnaturally long and sharp. “You shouldn’t have come.”

Clary sobs out a laugh. “Yeah, I’m getting that.”

“I’m sorry,” Izzy says again. She lifts one hand to touch Clary’s face, tracing over the bridge of her nose, her lips, across the edge of her jaw and down her throat with one cool finger. It settles above her carotid artery, presses in just enough to hurt. Clary can feel her pulse beating hard against the pad of Izzy’s finger, and a rush of lightheadedness washes over her.

Izzy lifts her head to stare at her with a dark, hungry kind of focus, and Clary, unthinking, closes the distance between them and kisses her.

Later, she won’t be able to say why she does it. Maybe it was some last desperate instinct; maybe she just doesn’t want to die without knowing what it’s like to kiss Izzy at least once. She doesn’t expect it to change anything. Izzy might recognize her, but she knows that doesn’t make a difference now.

For a moment, it’s like trying to kiss a statue, cold and unyielding. Then Izzy makes another small, hungry sound, and her lips part. She tastes like bitter iron and her hands are on Clary’s jaw suddenly, gripping tight enough to bruise. Holding her still while Izzy licks into her mouth. She pushes closer, shoving Clary’s legs apart with her knee so that she can press between them, so that Clary is practically straddling her thigh, and Clary swallows a strangled, startled noise. She’d pull back, but Izzy isn’t letting her go.

Heat skitters up her spine, and Clary finds herself gasping against Izzy’s mouth, suddenly, desperately turned on.

Izzy is still kissing her with a fierce single-mindedness, and Clary grinds down again, more deliberately, feels as much as hears Izzy growl against her mouth. There’s a voice in the back of her head demanding to know what the _hell _she thinks she’s doing right now, but it’s drowned under a hot wave of arousal.

Anyway, it’s not like she could get away if she wanted to.

As soon as she thinks that, Izzy releases her. She doesn’t pull back, though. Her hands skim down the sides of Clary’s neck, over her shoulders, then lower, cupping her breasts in both palms, thumbs scraping over her nipples through her thin shirt.

“Oh, fuck,” Clary breathes. Izzy pulls back just enough to look at her. Her lovely eyes are dark and intent from a couple of inches away, cataloging Clary’s reaction as she does it again. Clary moans high in the back of her throat, rocking down against Izzy’s thigh again. She can feel herself getting wet, slicking the inside of her panties, the seam of her jeans dragging against her clit as she moves. Izzy pinches her nipples again, and then, in a sudden rough motion, tears her shirt open. The cloth parts with a loud ripping sound, baring her to the cool night air and Izzy’s hands, which are only a few degrees warmer. Slender fingers pluck at her nipples, drawing them into hard points.

Heat is pooling between her legs, arousal twisting through the pit of her stomach, and it occurs to Clary that she’s going to come like this, just like this, riding Izzy’s thigh up against a wall out here in the open. Izzy shoves closer, the muscles in her leg flexing, and dips her head just enough to suck Clary’s nipple into her mouth. Clary cries out, slapping her hands against the metal wall with a loud _clang_, and Izzy licks over her nipple again, then falls to her knees, yanking Clary’s jeans and underwear down as she goes. She shoves her face between Clary's legs, sets her mouth against her clit and sucks hard, and Clary just--shatters, fisting her hands in Izzy’s hair and pushing against Izzy’s mouth, swearing and begging so loudly that anyone within a block could hear them and she doesn’t even _care._

Izzy works her through it and doesn’t pull away until Clary shoves at her, shaking and oversensitive.

“Izzy, please,” she begs. She doesn’t even know what she’s asking for; her mind feels like a perfect, whited-out blank. “Please, please,” and her hands are tugging at Izzy’s hair, her shoulders, her torn dress, and finally, _finally_ Izzy stands, pressing back into her space.

“Clary,” Izzy breathes, and kisses her again, hard, repeating her name like it’s the only word that lives on her tongue. “Clary, Clary.”

Clary lets out a breathless laugh and reaches for her. This is insane, this is actually completely insane, but it’s Izzy’s body beneath her hands, her slender waist and generous hips, the swell of her breasts. Clary cups them in her palms, but Izzy is wearing a bra and it’s not like _she_ can just tear cloth apart with her bare hands. She slips her hands lower instead, down over Izzy’s hips to her bare thighs, pushing her short dress up. It’s tight enough that it bunches around her hips and stays there, and Clary really wishes she could pull back enough to really see Izzy like this, desperate and fierce and bare to the night air, but the wall’s in her way and Izzy isn’t moving back.

Her panties are dark lace, scratchy when Clary slips a hand inside to press her fingers against Izzy’s pussy. She’s wet, she’s so wet, slick against Clary’s fingers as she rocks down on them with a keening sound, her fingers digging painfully into Clary’s skin. If Clary gets out of this in one piece she’s going to have bruises for a week, but that's the furthest thing from her mind right now. The angle is awkward like this, but she slides her hand lower, pressing the heel of her palm to Izzy’s clit and slipping two fingers into her wet cunt.

Izzy gasps, rocks down onto her hand, fucking herself onto Clary's fingers. It's barely a minute later before she’s moaning into Clary’s mouth, shuddering as she comes. Her hands drop to Clary’s hips, gripping tight, and then she kisses Clary so hard that she can taste blood on her tongue.

Izzy jerks away at that. Her eyes are wild, her mouth open and gasping, and for a moment Clary thinks, _this is it, _this is how she’s going to die, half-naked and desperate in Izzy’s arms—

And then Izzy shoves herself backward. Her eyes are huge and dark; she seems truly _present_ for the first time. There’s a flush high in her cheeks and her mouth and chin are wet with Clary’s juices. She’s beautiful, she’s so beautiful, and Clary reaches for her, says, “Izzy—”

“Clary,” Izzy breathes, taking another stumbling step back. She shakes her head like she’s trying to clear water out of it, takes another step backwards, shoves her dress back down, and then she’s just--gone in a sudden blur of vampiric speed. Leaving Clary alone in the shadows between two buildings, her skin still hot and singing from Izzy’s touch.

Clary lets her head fall back against the wall as the echoes of Izzy’s footsteps fade into silence. After a moment, she tugs her clothing back into place, stoops to pick up with stake discarded a few feet away, and stands.

She tugs her torn shirt together as well as she can, and only then realizes that the back of her throat is aching, her field of vision wavering with tears.


End file.
